Tuesday, January 04, 2011

Summer Football: Time For A Trial?

Was having my weekly gander at the East Lothian Courier to see which of my erstwhile school mates were making an appearance in the courts pages when I came across another argument for summer football:

Davie McGlynn, manager of Superleague outfit Musselburgh Athletic, said a combination of dreadful winter weather, the economic downturn and cutbacks across Scottish football had created a "terrible situation" for clubs.

"Summer football needs to happen," said McGlynn. "If we were playing say February to November we'd avoid the worst of the winter weather. Clubs would be able to play their games and get the gate money in to keep themselves ticking over.

"We get crowds of around 200 at home games. We need the money that brings in to pay wages and keep the club going."

Earlier this month McGlynn gloomily predicted junior clubs might have to stop paying players as they faced up to growing financial pressures.

"By the time you add together players' wages, laundry bills, training facilities, transport costs and everything else you're looking at around £40,000 just to keep a club going for one season," said McGlynn.

"Our next game is supposed to be January 7 but that depends on the weather.

"We might not play again until February and then we'll be in the crazy situation of trying to cram all our games in before June."


Now, I'm still not convinced by how viable summer football is. But the debate is now happening. Why not at least trial it in the junior leagues?

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